Traditionally, motion pictures have been distributed to movie theaters in the form of multiple expensive and bulky film reels. In practice, for instance, a typical motion picture would be structured as a set of 3-5 large reels of film. Once the studio and post-production houses complete production of the motion picture, one or more distributors would deliver the set of reels by courier to each and every theater that will be showing the motion picture. At each theater, a projection mechanic would then splice the reels together and feed the film into a projector. Furthermore, in typical practice, a given set of film reels lasts for only a limited number of showings before the film gets worn and is then discarded or replaced. Consequently, after a certain number of showings, a new set of the bulky and expensive film reels may need to be delivered by courier to the theater and again prepared for showing. Overall, the process of distributing motion pictures to theaters has been expensive and cumbersome.
In recent years, significant advances have occurred in video technology. The advent of high definition television and digital video (e.g., digital cable and satellite), as well as new forms of digital video projection, has given consumers a taste for drastically improved video quality. Further, cable, satellite, and other network communications have ushered in a new era of video distribution.
Recognizing the expensive and burdensome nature of traditional motion picture delivery, the motion picture industry is currently transitioning from film cinema to digital cinema. In particular, rather than (or in addition to) producing and distributing a motion picture on a set of bulky film reels, many studios, post-production houses, and other movie distribution organizations are beginning to produce and distribute motion pictures digitally.
In practice today, digital cinema content is delivered to theaters in encrypted form on computer hard drives. In particular, a motion picture may be stored on a hard drive as a set of encrypted files (sometimes still called “reels”) each comprising a portion of the motion picture, and each theater may be equipped with a computer or other media player to which the hard drive can be connected as well as a digital video projector (e.g. a DLP projector) suitable for projecting the video content onto a large theater screen. For a given motion picture, the distributor would thus deliver a copy of the hard drive to each theater that will be digitally presenting the motion picture. Alternatively, any of a variety of other mechanisms could be used to deliver the digital cinema content to theaters.
In turn, it is of course also necessary to provide authorized movie theaters with appropriate decryption keys for use to decrypt the digital cinema content, so as to facilitate playout of the content. Furthermore, to help avoid unauthorized playout of digital cinema content, it may also be necessary to control such playout on a screen-by-screen basis. In particular, it may be necessary to provide decryption keys that are specific to particular theater projectors or screens, such that a given key may facilitate playout of given digital cinema content by just a given projector. Still further, it may be necessary to limit the scope of such playout, to allow only a certain number of plays or to allow playout at only certain times or days for instance.